Well, Strange Journey is shaping up to be the best RPG that came out this month.

As if there was any doubt.

Edit: Just got my copy in the mail!!! Packaging is nice. I've been hearing all over the Atlus boards that the CD included with the preorder is a data cd and won't play on CD players. I heard it rips fine on Macs, though.

I don't have time to play it today, but I'll definitely digging my claws into it over the weekend.

Went and got this. I haven't played it yet because I went to home depot afterwards and bought a nipple cactus, and as soon as I got back to my dorm (walking to and from gamestop is like, an hour and a half process) I had to unpot the cactus, and then I was fuckken hungry so I went to the dorm across the way to get some stew.

Anyway, I'm going into self-induced exile for a week (or more) until I can actually finish some of the milestones for Boolean RPG. I haven't worked on that since Christmas, and since I dropped OpenGL class I feel like programming on my own again.

So... I'll give my impressions then.

Logged

o/` I do not feel joy o/`o/` I do not dream o/`o/` I only stare at the door and smoke o/`

Well, Strange Journey is shaping up to be the best RPG that came out this month.

As if there was any doubt.

I didn't have any doubts that it would be, but the disparity between the quality of the titles still surprised me. The story and setting so far is interesting, and the music, the music is just great. Meguro has created another soundtrack that both fits and further defines the game's atmosphere. I'm really glad I got the actual soundtrack, as the one Atlus generously included only has 10 of the 31 songs. I don't think I've been disappointed by anything Meguro has made yet, even the oft despised Persona 3 and 4 soundtracks had some great battle tunes and some slower ones like Memories of the City which are glossed over when people mention them. However, all the other songs that do successfully fit the style of the games are really boring by themselves. That doesn't seem to be the case with Strange Journey, I really look forward to listening to the soundtrack in its entirety later. Finally, the battle system is what you'd expect from a Shin Megami Tensei game and it's still as addictive as ever.

Well, Strange Journey is shaping up to be the best RPG that came out this month.

As if there was any doubt.

I didn't have any doubts that it would be, but the disparity between the quality of the titles still surprised me. The story and setting so far is interesting, and the music, the music is just great. Meguro has created another soundtrack that both fits and further defines the game's atmosphere. I'm really glad I got the actual soundtrack, as the one Atlus generously included only has 10 of the 31 songs. I don't think I've been disappointed by anything Meguro has made yet, even the oft despised Persona 3 and 4 soundtracks had some great battle tunes and some slower ones like Memories of the City which are glossed over when people mention them. However, all the other songs that do successfully fit the style of the games are really boring by themselves. That doesn't seem to be the case with Strange Journey, I really look forward to listening to the soundtrack in its entirety later. Finally, the battle system is what you'd expect from a Shin Megami Tensei game and it's still as addictive as ever.

Maybe I'm living in my own P3/4 soundtrack loving world...seriously these or oft despised? They are so much fun and are as important to the atmosphere of the games as the art imho. Anyhoo I love Meguro's work...I have a massive playlist on my Zune of all my Mega Ten soundtracks and I just shuffle em most of the time.Been holding off on the SJ soundtrack untill after I at least get a chance to boot the game lol.

« Last Edit: March 25, 2010, 09:31:10 AM by citizenchris099 »

Logged

-- Chris

----------------------------------------------------------------------"Everything that happens will happen today and nothing has changed, but nothing's the same and every tomorrow could be yesterday and everything that happens will happen today"

Is it possible to get Jiminez to die instead of Gore? It's vaguely implied that you can stop Gore from going into that battle, but I'm not sure if that dialogue choice makes a difference in the story or just affects your alignment.Second, the music. While I can't really imagine listening to the bulk of it *outside* of the game, the dark, percussion-driven ambiance of it sets the mood perfectly *in* game. It's atonal, dissonant, and paranoid, which doesn't make it good for casual listening the same way you could do with P3's music, but it does fit the whole "going into the unknown" theme. The ones on the CD are definitely more melody driven and listenable on their own, so the selection makes sense. The dungeon themes seem like they're more variations on a single leitmotif (so far). The audio quality is wonderful. The drums actually have punch to them. I mean, not that I doubt the DS's audio capabilities. I have Korg DS-10. But still.

Anyway, gameplay. It's cool they used the EO engine. It moves a lot faster than EO, though. Battles are quicker, there's more savepoints, and there's a more directed sense of progression.

Dungeon layouts -- the two floors I've seen so far of Antlia in any case -- I like more than in EO. Both floors have used a hub-and-spoke design, which is more manageable than EO's somewhat meandering layouts. I doubt there's going to be anything as awesome as Nocturn's Diet Building though, but you can't really do something like that in the kind of 2.5D SJ uses. Oh, I do like how the ice parts of Antlia remind me of Dezo in phantasy star 1.

Not sure how I feel about press turn getting removed. The ganging up system is great, though. I like how alignment's really important again, since it was really de-emphasized in Nocturne and didn't have much of a gameplay affect in DS2. Also, the ganging up stuff makes it more interesting than just LOL U R LAW CAN'T RECRUIT ME~~ which just sort of got annoying in SMT1 and 2. Also really liked how you could use your demons to help in conversations in DS2. I'd like to see that in another game, though its omission here doesn't bug me.

The way analyze works is cool in that it's sort of this weird mix of what Persona 3 did with DS2's loyalty system. Actually, I like the suit in general. It gives it a nice metroidvania aspect. I thought the devilyzer addons in the Devil Children games was a neat idea and I'm glad they revived that in the form of Sub Apps.

And I think they got the scientist/soldier exploration mood down reeaal fine.

I named my dude Alden Gray, after Neil Alden Armstrong and Zane Grey. The first man on the moon and a Wild West novelist. Seems appropriate.

« Last Edit: March 25, 2010, 10:10:29 AM by MeshGearFox »

Logged

o/` I do not feel joy o/`o/` I do not dream o/`o/` I only stare at the door and smoke o/`

Well, Strange Journey is shaping up to be the best RPG that came out this month.

As if there was any doubt.

I didn't have any doubts that it would be, but the disparity between the quality of the titles still surprised me. The story and setting so far is interesting, and the music, the music is just great. Meguro has created another soundtrack that both fits and further defines the game's atmosphere. I'm really glad I got the actual soundtrack, as the one Atlus generously included only has 10 of the 31 songs. I don't think I've been disappointed by anything Meguro has made yet, even the oft despised Persona 3 and 4 soundtracks had some great battle tunes and some slower ones like Memories of the City which are glossed over when people mention them. However, all the other songs that do successfully fit the style of the games are really boring by themselves. That doesn't seem to be the case with Strange Journey, I really look forward to listening to the soundtrack in its entirety later. Finally, the battle system is what you'd expect from a Shin Megami Tensei game and it's still as addictive as ever.

Maybe I'm living in my own P3/4 soundtrack loving world...seriously these or oft despised? They are so much fun and are as important to the atmosphere of the games as the art imho. Anyhoo I love Meguro's work...I have a massive playlist on my Zune of all my Mega Ten soundtracks and I just shuffle em most of the time.Been holding off on the SJ soundtrack untill after I at least get a chance to boot the game lol.

My thoughts exactly. Obviously not everybody likes them but oft despised? Hell, I've been playing the hell out of the Persona Music Live dvd, it's friggin' amazing! Meguro, I bow to thy.

Maybe I'm living in my own P3/4 soundtrack loving world...seriously these or oft despised?

I've mostly seen indifference or hate towards the soundtracks, and of the two it's usually the latter. Again, I don't think it's warranted but it's what I've seen, and I could have somehow passed over positive opinions on the soundtracks. I've seen these comments on other gaming websites and some podcasts I've listened to.

A lot of the old school Megaten heads have particular hate towards the music in P3+4. The games in general, actually. Personally, I enjoy both soundtracks as well as both games. I don't have any aversion towards the older games over the new either. Of the ones that I've played, I like them all.

Maybe I'm living in my own P3/4 soundtrack loving world...seriously these or oft despised? They are so much fun and are as important to the atmosphere of the games as the art imho. Anyhoo I love Meguro's work...I have a massive playlist on my Zune of all my Mega Ten soundtracks and I just shuffle em most of the time.

From what I've heard... yes. They're pretty light/upbeat and not your typical SMT soundtrack, I think they're just too different for some people. To me they're not my favorite SMT soundtracks ever, but they're fun and fit their games well just like Meguro's other SMT soundtracks.

Maybe I'm living in my own P3/4 soundtrack loving world...seriously these or oft despised? They are so much fun and are as important to the atmosphere of the games as the art imho. Anyhoo I love Meguro's work...I have a massive playlist on my Zune of all my Mega Ten soundtracks and I just shuffle em most of the time.Been holding off on the SJ soundtrack untill after I at least get a chance to boot the game lol.

Well, I wouldn't say I hate the soundtrack as a whole, but I must say that I found P3's battle theme very irritating by the end of the game. It's not something I mind listening to once or twice but for the amount of time you spend listening to it in that game it just didn't work for me...I actually found myself trying to finish all my battles before the chorus kicked in.

I haven't played Devil Survivor or Strange Journey. So far, which would you say is shaping up to be better as far as gameplay and story goes (guesstimates obviously since Strange Journey just came out)?